


first of her name

by Heather



Category: Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Future, F/F, First Kiss, Groping, Hurt/Comfort, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-11-18
Updated: 2017-11-18
Packaged: 2019-02-01 14:05:26
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12706497
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Heather/pseuds/Heather
Summary: Daenerys didn't lose the war. That doesn't mean she won.





	first of her name

**Author's Note:**

  * For [coaldustcanary](https://archiveofourown.org/users/coaldustcanary/gifts).



> For coaldustcanary and their very intriguing prompt, "Dany wins the coming war(s), doesn't become queen, but survives and maintains a relationship with Yara somehow."

The Iron Islands were not at all how Daenerys had imagined them.

She thought it might have been the "island" part of the description that undid her. After growing up in Essos, the word conjured in her mind a picture of something bright and warm, with blue seas and golden sand, perhaps with lemon trees in the bargain.

The part she ought to have focused on was the comparison to iron. The landscape that stretched before her was scrubby and hard, studded with rocks, and as chill and grey as metal- the kind of thing she had imagined when she had tried to picture the North. Having been there, she knew the North was even worse; but she had not expected they would be even this close.

Some of this must have showed on her face, because her traveling companion gave her a twisted smile and said, "You look disappointed. Does your new home not live up to your queenly standards?"

Daenerys felt her cheeks grow red with mortification. "No. It's- beautiful," she said, cursing herself for her obvious hesitation.

Yara wasn't fooled, either. "They're not known for their beauty, or preferred for it either. We may not be in the best place for waging a war but we've also rarely been conquered." She reached over and tweaked a lock of Dany's hair by her ear. "Not the worst place you could have asked for to hide, all things considered."

Dany reached up and toyed with the strand Yara had just pulled. Her hair was now cropped boyish and short, dyed black as a raven's wing. It was meant to disguise her- no one in Westeros had the silver blonde hair of Old Valyria anymore, Yara had told her, and Daenerys had seen the truth of that for herself- but it made her feel uneasy, even weakened. She had lived in exile from when she was still attached to her wet nurse's breasts, but she had never been _hiding_ before.

Yara seemed to take pity on her, laying her hand on top of Dany's in her hair. "It'll take getting used to," she said.

"But I'll be safe here?" Dany asked, nearly cringing at her own palpable bitterness. Yara was being generous to shelter her, especially with what a boon it would be in her new role as the first Iron Queen to hand Daenerys over to the Lannisters. The bounty alone would have kept her people through the first year of winter.

Still, it galled her- to have come this far, to have defeated the Others, to have lost everything she loved to save the people of Westeros- only to have to spend the rest of her days the way she had begun: a tyrant's orphan living on charity.

"Mostly," Yara said, watching her with a studious look that gave Dany the unnerving feeling that Yara could see every thought that she had, written as plain on her face as in a maester's book. "I can't promise you no one will ever recognize you and see us both hanged for the fortune it'd bring them. Nor that one of your former allies will never figure out you're here and hang you themselves to deprive Cersei of the pleasure."

Daenerys wondered if Yara was thinking of little Lyanna Mormont, who had as yet to forgive Dany for getting Jon Snow to bend the knee; or of the Houses of Dorne, who still mourned Ellaria Sand and her brood- and had for the last four months been beset on all sides by thousands of Dothraki that no longer answered to their Khaleesi.

"You'll be in need of a name," Yara said. "The one you've got won't get you a warm welcome anywhere, even here."

The loss of her hair at once seemed minimal. The thought of even her own name being taken from her felt like molten lead being poured over her heart. Daenerys felt her face going stiff, as though it was trying of its own accord to keep her from weeping. "Must I choose it now?"

"We'll be on the island within the hour," Yara said. "Better to have it before we get there than after, unless you mean to try your hand at pretending you don't speak the common tongue and haven't told it to me."

Against her will, Dany laughed. "I could. What do you suppose the chances would be that any of your people would recognize High Valyrian if it was spoken in their hearing?"

"A maester might," Yara said. "Wouldn't chance it if I were you."

"Would you have chanced coming here at all?" Daenerys asked. "If you were me?"

Yara looked at her for a long moment, chewing her lip as she thought. "Truth be told, no," she said. "I wouldn't trust me as far as the shores of King's Landing, let alone all the way to Pyke."

Dany looked at her in faint surprise. "Whyever not?"

"I haven't named a price for bringing you here," Yara said. "Were I you, that would make me wonder."

Daenerys tried to shrug her hair behind her shoulders, remembering too late that she no longer could. "Were you me," she said, "you might have thought that I have nothing to offer you now, and that might alter the question of prices."

Yara smiled, threading her hand into the roots of Dany's shorn hair. "Were I you," she said, "I might have remembered with whom I was dealing."

Dany's heart gave a stunned little throb in her chest as her knees started to shake under her weight. It wasn't an unpleasant sensation. The surprise, more than anything, was what leveled her so. She managed, with effort, to return Yara's smile. "You can't be serious."

"I wouldn't say I am," Yara said. Her smile took on a more lecherous edge. "Of course, nor would I say I'm not."

"Even now?" She asked. "When I don't have anything to offer you?"

Yara thumbed at Dany's lower lip, rough-skinned but gentle for all of that. "I wouldn't say you have nothing. And you are now without several distractions."

Dany thought of Daario, perhaps still fighting slavery in Essos in her name; of Xaro Xhoan Doxas, who had once demanded her hand for safe passage. She thought of Jon Snow, and one night that could have been something. 

"I think I am tired," she said, "of people who think I can be had for an evening of charm."

Yara grinned, uninsulted. "So you think I have charm."

Daenerys laughed again. "I admit that you have a way of making me forget for a moment all the things I have to trouble me."

"I do try," Yara said. She wrapped an arm around Dany's shoulders, and Dany was surprised by how warm and solid she felt, how comfortable it was. Her head started to tilt towards Yara's shoulder on instinct, and it took all of her self-control not to nestle against her the rest of the way.

It seemed Yara could read that, too. She turned her face into Dany's hair and said, warm and low, "I would wager you have never kissed anyone unless they had it in their power to help make you a queen."

"You might win that wager," Daenerys said. She didn't flinch at how mercenary it sounded, but she did squirm at the obvious implications of what Yara was after. 

"I don't have any more thrones to offer you," Yara said, "but had you ever considered it just for fun?"

"Fun?" Dany asked, with a dry, skeptical laugh. 

Yara raised her hand to cup one of Daenerys' breasts. "Yes," she said, squeezing. "Fun."

Dany just managed not to jump in startlement, closing her eyes at the unexpected contact and the even more unexpected pleasure she got from it. 

She felt, rather than saw, Yara smile against her temple as she squeezed Dany's breast again. She slid her fingers between the laces of Dany's gown so that she could trace her fingertip in a teasing circle around her nipple.

Daenerys bit her lip nearly to bleeding to hold back a moan. "You couldn't imagine better timing for this?"

"If I waited for a better time, I might never do anything," Yara said. "And really... don't you think you deserve a little pleasure in your life now?"

Dany thought about how little there was left to her to bring her any kind of pleasure. "Perhaps," she said. Yara's grip on her breast intensified and she hissed as she tried to finish her thought. "But I would fear that I was only using you in a different way."

Yara let go of her breast to tilt Dany's chin up. Dany opened her eyes to look at her and was startled again by the sincerity in her eyes.

"Use me if you need, Your Grace," she said. "It won't hurt me and it might help you."

Dany tipped her head down to kiss her.

Yara kissed with more patience and restraint than she did anything else. She let Daenerys lead the way, opening her mouth only when Dany's tongue touched her lip, holding her closer only when Dany leaned her weight against her body. She took it slow and luxurious, in a manner that Dany might have described as loving in a person who knew her well enough to love her.

Daenerys broke away and leaned her face against Yara's neck. "I'm not ready," she admitted, quiet.

"That's all right," Yara said. "I'll be here when you are."

Dany smiled. "For the moment, could you do me a favor?"

Yara chuckled. "I think I've done you quite a few favors of late," she said. "But ask."

"Choose a name for me," she said. "I think... I think if it's left to me, I will never be able to think of anything, just pine for my true one."

"Of course." Yara held her close and held her tight. "I'll make sure it's one fit for a queen."


End file.
